...rummaging through the debris in "post-racial" America...
My Book:
(click photo above)
"The Selma of the North": Civil Rights Insurgency in Milwaukee
Between 1958 and 1970, a distinctive movement for racial justice emerged from unique circumstances in Milwaukee. A series of local leaders inspired growing numbers of people to participate in campaigns against employment and housing discrimination, segregated public schools, the membership of public officials in discriminatory organizations, welfare cuts, and police brutality.
The Milwaukee movement culminated in the dramatic—and sometimes violent—1967 open housing campaign. A white Catholic priest, James Groppi, led the NAACP Youth Council and Commandos in a militant struggle that lasted for 200 consecutive nights and provoked the ire of thousands of white residents. After working-class mobs attacked demonstrators, some called Milwaukee “the Selma of the North.” Others believed the housing campaign represented the last stand for a nonviolent, interracial, church-based movement.
Patrick Jones tells a powerful and dramatic story that is important for its insights into civil rights history: the debate over nonviolence and armed self-defense, the meaning of Black Power, the relationship between local and national movements, and the dynamic between southern and northern activism. Jones offers a valuable contribution to movement history in the urban North that also adds a vital piece to the national story.
Think you know the full story of the civil rights era? Patrick Jones's masterful study of the movement in Milwaukee will make you think again. Meticulously researched and elegantly written, The Selma of the North provides a devastating rebuttal of many of the conventional narratives of the civil rights movement. Here a vibrant nonviolent movement in the de-industrializing Midwest grows into a Black Power movement led by urban youth and a white Catholic priest who use confrontational direct action to lay bare the fissures of racial inequality in the 'liberal' North. --Jeanne Theoharis, Brooklyn College, editor of Freedom North and Groundwork
A well-researched, well-written, and important history. Based on a rich array of sources, this book enhances our understanding of civil rights activism in the postwar urban North and establishes a useful foundation for the comparison of similar developments elsewhere in the country. --Joe William Trotter, Jr., Carnegie Mellon University, author of Black Milwaukee
This book fills a serious gap in the literature of the civil rights revolution, joining studies on other cities in laying the groundwork on race and civil rights in the postwar urban North. Jones tells a good story, capturing events that might otherwise be lost to history. --Arnold R. Hirsch, University of New Orleans, author of Making the Second Ghetto
The Selma of the North is an insightful and invigorating addition to the growing literature on black freedom struggles outside of the South. Jones's important and informative account writes Milwaukee back into the narrative of the civil rights-Black Power era and in the process expands our understanding of postwar America. --Peniel E. Joseph, Brandeis University, author of Waiting Till the Midnight Hour
The Selma of the North is a riveting new story of the civil rights movement in America, a tale on par with Selma, Birmingham, and Montgomery in its power and importance. Jones's magisterial research and magnetic prose illuminate the untold story of the battle for the urban north in the 1960s, a battle that shows how race has always been the Achilles heel of white progressives. This story transcends easy dichotomies of black and white, North and South, radical and reformist. How did a group called 'the Commandos' define nonviolence? How did a white Catholic priest become a 'Black Power' leader? If this is not a saga for the age of Obama, I don't know what is. --Timothy B. Tyson, Duke University, author of Radio Free Dixie and Blood Done Sign My Name
Odetta, the acclaimed folk singer and civil rights activist, has passed away of heart failure. Here is an excellent obituary from the New York Times. They also have a very nice video tribute here. Here is the NPR segment about Odetta. Here is Odetta talking about Dr. King and non-violence on the Tavis Smiley show. The image to the right is of Odetta performing at the historic 1963 March On Washington for Jobs & Freedom in Washington, D.C.
Here is Odetta rockin' out at the Newport festival:
There is a nice clip of her performing, "Give Me Your Hand," here.
Rest in Peace, Odetta. Thank you for your life lived in struggle...
South African music legend and freedom fighter Miriam Makeba has died following a heart attack shortly after finishing a concert in Italy to show solidarity for those fighting organized crime. Deoliver47 over at Daily Kos has a nice diary on Makeba, including a number of photos and video clips.
Makeba in 2000: “I just told the world the truth. And if my truth then becomes political, I can’t do anything about that.”
Give thanks and praises for Miriam Makeba and her inspirational life lived in struggle...
Legendary music producer, Jerry Wexler, died at the age of 91 a few days ago. Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, Wilson Pickett, Led Zepplin, Bob Dylan, Santana, Dire Straits and George Michael are just a few of the artists he produced at some point or another. Here is the New York Times obituary. Here is an excellent interview with Wexler from NPR's Fresh Air back in the 1990s. And here is a review of Wexler's autobiographical book about the music industry.
Utah Phillips, renowned Wobbly, folky and story-teller, has passed away. I had the great fortune to see a fantastic evening with Phillips back in my Madison days among a crowd that had more than its share of radicals and Wobblies.
Famed artist, Robert Rauschenberg, has died. He was 82. Rauschenberg was one of the most prolific and controversial major American artists of the last half of the 20th century. He pushed the boundaries of what art is and thereby infuriated a lot of folks. People tend to love or hate his work.
Here is the NYTimes obituary. Here is an interesting lengthy review of a book about Rauschenberg and the "neo-avant garde." Here are several pieces of his work...
Here he is talking about one of his controversial pieces:
Omaha-born Buddy Miles passed away recently. Miles was born in 1947 and by age 12 he was playing with his dad's jazz combo. As a session man, he played with bands like Ruby and the Romantics, the Delfonics and the Jaynetts. In 1967, he played with Wilson Pickett and the psychedelic blues, rock and soul group, Electric Flag, before forming his own group, the Buddy Miles Express. Later, he gained fame playing with Jimi Hendrix in "Band of Gypsys," which some call the first all-black rock band. Miles, who played on the landmark "Electric Ladyland" album, had "a brisk, assertive, deeply funky attack" that made him ideal for Jimi Hendrix's sound. Miles wrote the Hendrix classic, "Them Changes." He also had a flashy style, sporting huge afros and American flag shirts. In the 1970s, Miles cut two platinum albums with Carlos Santana and played with a diverse array of artists, inclusing Muddy Waters, John McLaughlin, Stevie Wonder, Bootsy Collins and David Bowie . After a stint in prison, he reemerged in the mid-1980s as a California Raisin in the popular ad campaign.
It's Friday, so put the politics down and enjoy some of the following clips of Buddy Miles in action. Dig it!
• Buddy Miles Express, "Them Changes" (Playboy Club, March 1971) (check out the dancers on this one!)
• "The Band of Gypsys" documentary (pt. 1):
• Band of Gypsys, "Machine Gun"
• Carlos Santana and Buddy Miles, "Them Changes" (Miles sings and plays guitar on this one)
• Carlos Santana and Buddy Miles, "Personal Contact" (Miles sings on this one)
Max Roach, one of the great drummers in jazz history, passed away on August 16th at the age of 83. As my friend Joe Germuska wrote, "Roach was a giant of the music who kept innovating after most of his generation had passed on and the rest had largely settled into a pretty comfortable niche. Roach, on the other hand, always pressed forward, advancing radical political views as well as a very fresh approach to sound." Amen.
Richard Harrington of the Washington Post suggests the following CDs:
• "Max Roach and Clifford Brown," Vols. 1 and 2, and "Daahoud" (all 1954). These three classic albums define the hard bop sound of the '50s, and give the promise of what would have been a seminal quintet had not Brown died in a car crash in 1956. • "The Max Roach 4 Plays Charlie Parker" (1958). A pianoless quartet explores music by or associated with Roach's first great musical partner.
• "We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite" (1960). A fiery melding of politics, racial justice and social aspiration, with lyrics by the late Oscar Brown Jr.
• "Percussion Bitter Sweet" (1961). Another politically tinged outing with help from Eric Dolphy and Clifford Jordan, among others.
• "M'Boom" (1979). Rhythm was fundamental to the instruments used here, but used in way that reflected what Roach called "the traditional definition of music . . . an equal triangle of harmony, melody and rhythm."
Odetta, the acclaimed folk singer and civil rights activist, has passed away of heart failure. Here is an excellent obituary from the New York Times. They also have a very nice video tribute here. Here is the NPR segment about Odetta. Here is Odetta talking about Dr. King and non-violence on the Tavis Smiley show. The image to the right is of Odetta performing at the historic 1963 March On Washington for Jobs & Freedom in Washington, D.C.
